Fourteen dead in disabled workshop fire

27 November 2012 — 8:13am

BERLIN: Fourteen people died and several more were injured when fire swept through a workshop for disabled people in the Black Forest region of Germany, authorities say.

About 300 firefighters backed by helicopters battled the blaze in the town of Titisee-Neustadt in southwestern Germany for more than two hours on Monday, as some wearing breathing apparatus pulled several people from the stricken building.

Firefighters work at the scene where 14 people died.

Photo: AFP

The cause of the fire was not immediately known but there was a large police presence at the site. At least one explosion was believed to have taken place in a storage room.

It was unclear whether chemicals were stored in the room, but the workshop's activities included the treatment of wood.

Pictures showed smoke billowing out of the three-storey concrete building and firefighters helping the injured, some in wheelchairs, to helicopters and ambulances.

Advertisement

"We can tell you that we have 14 dead. The process of identification is ongoing," Karl-Heinz Schmid, a spokesman for police in the nearby city of Freiburg, told news channel N24.

"We also have a large number of injured who have been taken to hospital."

Authorities said seven people had been seriously injured. Most had suffered injuries due to smoke inhalation, police said. All seven were expected to survive, a police spokesman was quoted as saying.

Another police spokesman, Marco Troll, told AFP: "The building is empty. There are no further dead."

A source close to Caritas, the Catholic Church welfare association that runs the workshop, said there were 50 or 60 people aged between 20 and 65 in the building when the blaze broke out. The workshop employed about 120 people with disabilities.

The source said the majority were mentally disabled workers who were making wooden decorations for Christmas as well as electrical and metal goods.

The building was relatively modern and fully respected the fire regulations, the source stressed.

Psychological specialists were treating relatives of the victims at the scene.

"We are dealing here with people who of course do not react rationally," the news agency DPA quoted the local fire chief Alexander Widmaier as saying.